Hanging On
by destructogirl1031
Summary: S6 Buffy POV piece. Buffy is slowly dying...why can't she stop herself? Yes, I know vague summary. BS, BA. WIP.


**Title**: **_Hanging On_**

**Author:** Karla

**Summary**: Buffy POV piece from S6….why can't she stop herself? A little bit of insight into what was going through her mind. Starts off within canon, then branches off up to and after Buffy's "epiphany", becomes a rewrite of S6 and what _should _have happened, because my name isn't Marti Toxin.

Probably been done…but oh well.

**Pairing**: B/S, B/A, loose implications to A/C

**Rating**: R

**Category:** Angst with hope.

**Timeline**: Sometime after OMWF.

**Spoilers**: Not really, happens in S6, but doesn't really give any specifics away. Happens during S4, but I'm not really going to stick with canon.

_Well now I found myself  
Wish I was someone else  
My hands are stained with love  
Wish I could take it away  
I hid behind the shell  
In time the pain will melt  
My heart is stained with love  
Wish I could fake it _

Chapter 1

Night time was fast approaching, I sigh. "Here we go again" .It was my time. They were right. I _am_ a creature of the night. No matter how hard I tried, I would never be anything different. This was me. Buffy Summers, slayer of vampires. I laugh dryly; I might as well be a vampire, sleep all day and only come out at night. That's when I become the hunter….and they are the hunted.

_I gave my life away  
There's nothing left to say  
I gave my life away  
You take it in your way_

_You take it in your way _

Work. That's what this is. Not just the slaying, true, it is physical work…..But life. Living._ The hardest thing in this world, is to live in it_. To go on, after I….left. Is this how it is supposed to be? Is it supposed to be so hard? To put on this façade, to act like I am actually living and breathing and emoting. I was dead, I am still dead inside. The walking dead. The undead. I _am_ a vampire, how ironic. The very thing that I loathe and wage a nightly war against….and I've become one. I'm even fucking one. I want to scream. But no, someone might hear. And I'm not ready for that, will I ever be? Then I hear her voice. The innocence so saccharine, I almost want to cry.

"Buffy?", I look up the stairs to see Dawn.

"Yeah Dawn?",

"You're going patrolling again…" , she states. It wasn't a question.

"That's what I'm here for" _that seems like the only thing I'm here for_.

"Oh…ok, well just don't….don't come home too late alright?". I know what she wants to say….don't give up? Don't die? Don't _let_ myself die? - Something that is rapidly becoming harder and harder with each passing day.

"You know me!" I attempt to sound cheerful and carefree….like how the old me would say….the _real _ Buffy…not this, empty shell that I've become.

"Well…I'll see you in the morning then?" I nod. She looks at me again, as if she wants to say something. But she doesn't, and I am relieved. I let out a breath I don't realize I'm holding because I really don't feel like getting into this again.

As the sun completely sets, I sigh. I put on my jacket, grab my keys and put a stake in my back pocket. I ask my self again and again, why do I continue to bring it? Because I never use it. Nope. Not on this vampire. I should, but I just don't have the strength anymore.

_My selfish enemy  
Still has the best of me  
Empty and feeling numb  
Wish I could take it away  
I can't control the need  
To weak to not concede  
Wish I was deaf and dumb  
Wish I could fake It _

I open the door, lock it and walk down the porch – something so mundane, yet at the same time so arduous. I turn around in time to see the light in Dawn's room switch off. Then I head off into the direction of Restfield Cemetery. Where he is…where he always is, waiting, wanting. It chills and disturbs me that he is always standing by the door to his crypt, with this…smirk on his face. It disgusts me. He knows I can't, won't, resist; it makes me feel ashamed and dirty and I hate it! I hate him and I hate myself, yet I keep coming back for more. I force the tears back.

_I gave my life away  
There's nothing left to say_

_I gave my life away  
You take it in your way_

I gave my life away  
There's nothing left to say  
I gave my life away  
You take it in your way 

Why though. Is the sex great? Well…I've had better. Is it always because I'm comparing to _him_? Probably. Why is it everything always came down to _him_? Does he think of me as much as I did him? Does he dream about me? Dream of things that can and will never be, of his lips on mine. His lips everywhere, on me, inside me….. I shake my head, no, don't do this, do _not_ start thinking of him. The more you think of him, the more you'll want to go to him…and that just all ends in badness. It makes me feel like dying….again. Then I'll just come back more fucked up than I already am.

Is part of it the bad boy thing? I always used to think so. But oddly enough, my…I don't know, with Spike, just proves to me it wasn't and it still isn't. Our bond, our relationship was (is) more than that. It wasn't (isn't)_ his _body, no matter how perfect, it wasn't (isn't) that half smile, no matter how charming, and it wasn't (isn't) because _he _can hold his own in a fight….it was (still) is _his_ soul. The way he used to look at me (still looks at me) with such intensity and love that I have to look away. The way he looked (looks) straight through me and into the very depths of my soul.

Heh…soulmates, I scoff. What a ridiculous concept, seven years ago, it wouldn't have ever occurred to me. It seems like something made up, something that only happens in movies and fairy tales. Not something easily explained. It's something innate, something inside you. _It's blood. Blood screaming inside you to work its will. _How ironic to have once had _Spike_ speak these very words to me. That was a lifetime ago. Or two, but who's counting? Love, is it even enough? I don't know if I'm capable of love anymore. The white knight is supposed to come save the princess, isn't that how the story goes? But he isn't the white knight, and I am not that girl awaiting her prince. I don't think I _can_ be saved.

_Oh now I found myself  
Wish I was someone else  
My hands are stained with love  
Wish I could FAKE_

This is me, what I've become; this is what I am now. I picture Spike in the throws of ecstasy, I retch. This is what I'm _doing_ now. This is the only way I know how to feel, no matter how much it makes me feel like shit. No matter how much I degrade myself….and even Spike. Yes. Degrade _Spike._ I did see it that way. Don't ask me to use logic. Slaying doesn't even seem like a priority right now. Living…that's a twenty-four seven job. A job that I can't clock out of, I can't take a vacation. Well, I could if only…

I often think about cutting myself. Sometimes I wanted to so bad just see my own blood, just to feel my skin tearing, to make sure I was still alive. I can never bring myself to do it. Things like that are visible, and I need to be able to hide my shame or else it just leads to more questioning and intervention from…my friends. So I don't.

Friends.

Here I am standing in front of the gates of Restfield. Do I really want to go in there? Not really. But I know I will. Like some sort of magnetic force drawing me in. I circle around, not quite wanting to get to the cemetery….yet. Was it wanting? Needing maybe? But if I don't he might come looking for me. "I'll come back, just this once. This is the last time" I tell myself for the umpteenth time.

My thoughts return to my friends.

Friends. I laugh bitterly.

They missed me, they wanted me back. They loved me so much…I get that. I even understand that, but it doesn't keep me from hating them just a little bit.

My mind drifts off to those months? Years? Time ceased to exist when I was there. I guess my friends just bring new meaning to Rest In Peace, I think resentfully.

Life. Death, they seem almost…..synonymous? Life and death, did they even matter? Why does it matter so much? Why are Willow, Xander and Dawn so adamant that I _live_ life? There is no point. We live, just to die. And we do things, we have jobs, we have boyfriends or girlfriends…to what? Pass the time? Eighty odd years is a lot of fucking time. Why can't we come out of the womb, get straight to the point, and then just….die off. Then my life would be a lot less fucked up. Then, I'd think we'd have some sort of purpose. I wouldn't be here right now….like what? Some vampire whore? Or maybe it wouldn't even matter. Maybe I would just…slay some vampires, demons, save a few lives, have a hero party and then get to have what short life I could have had with….Him. Always _him_.

I come to the conclusion that I really don't give a fuck anymore. I mean how many times have I died? (Am still dead). What's the point of living if you're just going to die…and then on the flip side what's the point of dying if you're just going to _live _again? I guess they both aren't the big deal they once were. Life. Death. Big fucking deal, I'm faced with death everyday. It just doesn't have that same oomph anymore.

I circle around the cemetery again, lost in my train of thoughts.

Is fighting and fucking the only reasons I'm here for anyway, why I'm even alive? If you can call this black pit of despair being alive. Is this why the powers allowed me to come back? Was this they're great fucking plan all along, If this very second I had to make a decision. To be, or not to be, that is the million dollar question isn't it? Well I'd take death in a heartbeat. Death is my gift. And what a grand gift indeed. Wouldn't that be heaven.

"_Well that's everything huh? No weapons, no friends, no hope. Take all that away and what's left?"_

"_Me"_

I think of that day, that one fateful day. What _is_ left of me? Is there anything right of me? Heh. Stupid thought. I don't think there is even a me anymore. I left that Buffy 2 years to ago to be exact. That Buffy is long since past.

_I gave my life away  
There's nothing left to say  
I gave my life away  
You take it in your way_

I gave my life away  
There's nothing left to say  
I gave my life away  
You take it in your way

I stop abruptly at the gates, and there he is, with that god awful smirk that isn't _his_. "I've been waiting for you". Spike was not _him_. If I close my eyes, if I shut them real tight, maybe, maybe just for one second I can forget that I am fucking this demon. That I am not staring into hollow, frigid icy blue eyes, instead I am looking lovingly into the purity and warmth of mahogany ones. And it's not Spike ramming himself into me. I'm not with him in this dark, dank crypt. I am happy, _we _are happy. Content…pleasantly numb even, making_ love_ not just having sex. Not because I'm so screwed up that I have to fuck the evil undead.

He leads me to his crypt, and I can't resist (don't). This isn't real. I just want to feel. Feel something. WHY LIKE THIS? I want to pull out my hair and scream, and put one of us out of our misery. But I'm too void of emotion. I can't make myself care enough anymore. I don't have the will. Is it rape? It's not far from it. I don't want this (do I?) but I don't say no either.

I just let him.

_  
You take it in your way_

_You take it in your way _

_You take it in your way _

_You take it in your way _

TBC…..?


End file.
